Werewolf

A werewolf in mythology is a person who changes into a wolf each full moon. (the name coming from Old English, wer meaning man) The term `Lycanthropes' is sometimes used, from the Greek words for Wolf and Man.

The process of transmogrification is widely supposed in both film and literature to be painful; the resulting wolf is typically cunning but merciless, and prone to killing and eating people without compunction, regardless of the moral character of the person when human. People can supposedly be turned into werewolves either by a curse or by being bitten by another werewolves; supposedly the only way to kill a werewolf is with a silver object (usually a bullet). Werewolves have been dealt with in many movies, short stories, and novels, with varying degrees of success.

A recent theory has been proposed to explain werewolf episodes in Europe in the 18th and 19th centuries. Ergot?, which causes a form of [food poisoning]?, is a fungus that grows in place of rye? grains in wet growing seasons after very cold winters. Ergot poisoning usually affects whole towns or at least poor areas of towns and results in hallucinations, mass hysteria, and paranoia, as well as convulsions and sometimes death. (LSD is derived from ergot.) Ergot poisoning has been proposed as both a cause of an individual believing that he or she is a werewolf and of a whole town believing that they had seen a werewolf. Ergot has also been suggested as a cause for the "bewitchings" and mass hysteria leading to the [Salem witch trials]?.

There is also a (rare) mental disorder called Lycanthropy, in which the afflicted person believes him- or herself to be a werewolf.

A few of the films dealing with werewolves:

[An American Werewolf in London]?

[An American Werewolf in Paris]?

[The Howling]?

[Silver Bullet]?

[Teen Wolf]?

[Teen Wolf Too]?

see also vampire

/Talk